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It embarrasses me to see comments like this getting upvoted on HN. There is no information in it, just inflammatory language. When this sort of comment prevail

by pg 14y ago

It embarrasses me to see comments like this getting upvoted on HN. There is no information in it, just inflammatory language. When this sort of comment prevails on HN, we'll have sunk to the ground state of forums.

DenisM 14y ago
I subscribe to broken windows theory and think we should discourage any instance of sarcasm, adhom, and other inappropriate methods of arguing, no matter how small, so that larger transgressions look awfully out of place. It would help if you updated the rules with explicit ban on those things. It might also help to have a sort of discourse police - mods should not only ban for bad behavior but make it publicly visible.
samiur1204 14y ago
I'm never surprised to see these sorts of comments even in discussion forums that I hold in high esteem, such as HN. As an engineer, I've seen pretty heated arguments about very silly things such as whose editor is better. These are generally very intelligent people, but are susceptible to cognitive dissonance. Rational discourse goes out the window at that point, because they're convinced they're right and it's impossible that other view points may be correct. It's part of the reason most of the world is still religious. I bet you if there were down votes allowed on HN, this post would be about dead even, because tons of people probably disagree with him. But it's just the right sort of inflammatory comments that garners attention and get up votes too.
- pavs 14y ago
  > I bet you if there were down votes allowed on HN, this post would be about dead even, because tons of people probably disagree with him. Downvotes are allowed on HN, you have to have a certain amount of "points" to be able to downvote.
  - samiur1204 14y ago
    Ahh, that might be nice to get to someday.
- tptacek 14y ago
  Comments do get downvoted on HN. The question is, what kind of HN participant upvotes a comment like that? Who is deciding that that was a comment worth promoting, and why?
  - samiur1204 14y ago
    I'm sure a few people agree with what he said, because people tend to get swayed by forceful statements (eg. this is how Fox gets its viewership).
    - tptacek 14y ago
      When people upvote objectively bad comments, we get evidence that their votes should be weighted down.
      - diminish 14y ago
        clearly, there is no fair, well-defined measurement for 'bad comment', except for the number of upvotes and downvotes. if now votes themselves were voted, and in turn those were recursively voted; we would end up in a ridiculous web site where diversity does not prevail and majority suppresses minority.
        tptacek 14y ago
        I am done pretending that the diversity you're alluding to is valuable. It's not; it's toxic and stupid. Let this "minority" go crud up some other forum.
        samiur1204 14y ago
        While I think there are objectively bad comments, the attitude you're taking towards them may be a little unfair. People may have some opinions that are objectively wrong that can be repaired through allowing their comments to be seen and having us tell them why they're wrong.
- pron 14y ago
  OT but maybe not really: > Rational discourse goes out the window at that point, because they're convinced they're right and it's impossible that other view points may be correct. It's part of the reason most of the world is still religious. So you think that if people were only more open to rational discussion then fewer of them will stay religious? I think you are discounting the vital role irrationality plays in our lives and playing up the importance of rationality. I think religion offers people something that is beyond or external to rationality -- not something that opposes it. Same goes for "religious arguments" about editors. Instead of belittling such sentiments, you might want to find out why they're so prevalent and whether they are indeed harmful. I suggest you read Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground and Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain. These books have awarded me a lot of insight on the subject.
  - samiur1204 14y ago
    Actually have read Dostoyevsky's Notes from Underground. I'll look into the other book that you recommended too. And personally, I have nothing against people being religious and wasn't belittling that sentiment. I merely think that many people are indoctrinated into a religion at an early age, and "know" that they are right, and use various ways to rationalize the belief their parents instilled in them, instead of exploring their beliefs on their and coming to their own conclusions.
tptacek 14y ago
Why aren't you quietly penalizing people who upvote them? They're damaging the site. Here is a better question: why aren't you quietly penalizing people who submit the stories that generate these comments?
- samiur1204 14y ago
  Well. while I absolutely find these comments to be unhelpful, it's definitely not a good idea to censor comments or explicitly ban them. I'd like to think that we can filter out these comments by the community downvoting them rather than PG doing it himself. It should be a democratic process.
  - tptacek 14y ago
    HN is not a democracy, and it's not an open forum (whatever that means). It never was. If censoriousness drives users away... well, maybe that is itself a solution to a problem. Features that make HN disproportionately less attractive to the kinds of users who vote up comments like the one upthread sound like a good idea.
    - chacham15 14y ago
      While what you say is true, how many posts have you seen along the lines of "why was foo hellbanned" or "why was this post killed?" I think people would be upset if the response was because I think that they are detracting from the site.
      - tptacek 14y ago
        I don't like the way hellbanning works here, but that doesn't mean I'm going to pretend that crap like the TC/Mailbox Conspiracy comes from a minority we should protect, nor do I think hellban administration is a problem that needs to be fixed first.
- pg 14y ago
  We may try that one day. We've been marking such comments for a while in case we do.
eitland 14y ago
Maybe generalize some of these posts to the point where you can't google ypur way back to the original author, then add them to a " wall of shame"? (I sometimes find this tempting personally.) Examples are often a geeat way to learn.
tlogan 14y ago
Unfortunately, this comment (not the content of it and the entire situation) represents the state of entrepreneurship in SV :( As some older people said: if you live in a sea full of shit you are going to covered by shit.
mattmaroon 14y ago
Same with the original post really.
tatsuke95 14y ago
No information? There are people around this world and on this site who haven personal experience dealing with Mr. Arrington and/or have followed his antics for years. He's stirred up a bunch of unecessary drama, some much like has been brought against him. Remember his backroom VC deals series? Or accusing Leo Laporte of giving the Pre a positive report as a favour? That's real karma. I assume that some of the people who have upvoted my comment have, like myself, determined him to be someone I refuse to be bothered with. Certainly not bothered enough to feel sorry for him when accused of impropriety. He was a pretty good tech blogger who used his influence and money to become a VC. I see no reason to respect his work in the latter, especially when it can be tied to a possible conflict of interest. Understand the context of my comment: that we should be forbidden from "insulting" these people or companies. By suggesting there is some conflict of interest between their investment fund and companies that they cover? I whole-heartedly disagree with that. I think the way this is heading, with tech influencers, journalists and VC's intermingling, is bad. I guess that isn't as easy to agree with when you are a tech influencer, journalist or VC, or rely on one of these people. Luckily, I'm not and don't. As far as MG, information on his talents needs be nothing more than a perusal of his Techcrunch work. Judge for yourself. If this is the baseline for "good" tech writing, then the business is in a world of hurt. Writing over and over about the same few companies with shoddy analysis doesn't cut it for me. And if you read the comments that follow nearly every one of his old Techcrunch articles, you'd see I'm not alone, by any means. I guess not being able to say he sucks goes hand-in-hand with giving everyone a trophy at sporting events. The low of the state of the forums will be when we aren't allowed to speak our minds because we're edited out by the tech powers-that-be-- the Arringtons, the Sarah Lacey's-- and all the sites are not real journalism, but VC mouthpieces. That's where the "echo-chamber" meme comes from. Do you think that's a good end game? That's what we're talking about here.

by pg 14y ago

DenisM 14y ago

I subscribe to broken windows theory and think we should discourage any instance of sarcasm, adhom, and other inappropriate methods of arguing, no matter how small, so that larger transgressions look awfully out of place. It would help if you updated the rules with explicit ban on those things. It might also help to have a sort of discourse police - mods should not only ban for bad behavior but make it publicly visible.

samiur1204 14y ago

I'm never surprised to see these sorts of comments even in discussion forums that I hold in high esteem, such as HN. As an engineer, I've seen pretty heated arguments about very silly things such as whose editor is better. These are generally very intelligent people, but are susceptible to cognitive dissonance. Rational discourse goes out the window at that point, because they're convinced they're right and it's impossible that other view points may be correct. It's part of the reason most of the world is still religious. I bet you if there were down votes allowed on HN, this post would be about dead even, because tons of people probably disagree with him. But it's just the right sort of inflammatory comments that garners attention and get up votes too.

pavs 14y ago
> I bet you if there were down votes allowed on HN, this post would be about dead even, because tons of people probably disagree with him. Downvotes are allowed on HN, you have to have a certain amount of "points" to be able to downvote.
- samiur1204 14y ago
  Ahh, that might be nice to get to someday.
tptacek 14y ago
Comments do get downvoted on HN. The question is, what kind of HN participant upvotes a comment like that? Who is deciding that that was a comment worth promoting, and why?
- samiur1204 14y ago
  I'm sure a few people agree with what he said, because people tend to get swayed by forceful statements (eg. this is how Fox gets its viewership).
  - tptacek 14y ago
    When people upvote objectively bad comments, we get evidence that their votes should be weighted down.
    - diminish 14y ago
      clearly, there is no fair, well-defined measurement for 'bad comment', except for the number of upvotes and downvotes. if now votes themselves were voted, and in turn those were recursively voted; we would end up in a ridiculous web site where diversity does not prevail and majority suppresses minority.
      - tptacek 14y ago
        I am done pretending that the diversity you're alluding to is valuable. It's not; it's toxic and stupid. Let this "minority" go crud up some other forum.
        samiur1204 14y ago
        While I think there are objectively bad comments, the attitude you're taking towards them may be a little unfair. People may have some opinions that are objectively wrong that can be repaired through allowing their comments to be seen and having us tell them why they're wrong.
pron 14y ago
OT but maybe not really: > Rational discourse goes out the window at that point, because they're convinced they're right and it's impossible that other view points may be correct. It's part of the reason most of the world is still religious. So you think that if people were only more open to rational discussion then fewer of them will stay religious? I think you are discounting the vital role irrationality plays in our lives and playing up the importance of rationality. I think religion offers people something that is beyond or external to rationality -- not something that opposes it. Same goes for "religious arguments" about editors. Instead of belittling such sentiments, you might want to find out why they're so prevalent and whether they are indeed harmful. I suggest you read Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground and Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain. These books have awarded me a lot of insight on the subject.
- samiur1204 14y ago
  Actually have read Dostoyevsky's Notes from Underground. I'll look into the other book that you recommended too. And personally, I have nothing against people being religious and wasn't belittling that sentiment. I merely think that many people are indoctrinated into a religion at an early age, and "know" that they are right, and use various ways to rationalize the belief their parents instilled in them, instead of exploring their beliefs on their and coming to their own conclusions.

tptacek 14y ago

Why aren't you quietly penalizing people who upvote them? They're damaging the site. Here is a better question: why aren't you quietly penalizing people who submit the stories that generate these comments?

samiur1204 14y ago
Well. while I absolutely find these comments to be unhelpful, it's definitely not a good idea to censor comments or explicitly ban them. I'd like to think that we can filter out these comments by the community downvoting them rather than PG doing it himself. It should be a democratic process.
- tptacek 14y ago
  HN is not a democracy, and it's not an open forum (whatever that means). It never was. If censoriousness drives users away... well, maybe that is itself a solution to a problem. Features that make HN disproportionately less attractive to the kinds of users who vote up comments like the one upthread sound like a good idea.
  - chacham15 14y ago
    While what you say is true, how many posts have you seen along the lines of "why was foo hellbanned" or "why was this post killed?" I think people would be upset if the response was because I think that they are detracting from the site.
    - tptacek 14y ago
      I don't like the way hellbanning works here, but that doesn't mean I'm going to pretend that crap like the TC/Mailbox Conspiracy comes from a minority we should protect, nor do I think hellban administration is a problem that needs to be fixed first.
pg 14y ago
We may try that one day. We've been marking such comments for a while in case we do.

eitland 14y ago

Maybe generalize some of these posts to the point where you can't google ypur way back to the original author, then add them to a " wall of shame"? (I sometimes find this tempting personally.) Examples are often a geeat way to learn.

tlogan 14y ago

Unfortunately, this comment (not the content of it and the entire situation) represents the state of entrepreneurship in SV :( As some older people said: if you live in a sea full of shit you are going to covered by shit.

mattmaroon 14y ago

Same with the original post really.

tatsuke95 14y ago

No information? There are people around this world and on this site who haven personal experience dealing with Mr. Arrington and/or have followed his antics for years. He's stirred up a bunch of unecessary drama, some much like has been brought against him. Remember his backroom VC deals series? Or accusing Leo Laporte of giving the Pre a positive report as a favour? That's real karma. I assume that some of the people who have upvoted my comment have, like myself, determined him to be someone I refuse to be bothered with. Certainly not bothered enough to feel sorry for him when accused of impropriety. He was a pretty good tech blogger who used his influence and money to become a VC. I see no reason to respect his work in the latter, especially when it can be tied to a possible conflict of interest. Understand the context of my comment: that we should be forbidden from "insulting" these people or companies. By suggesting there is some conflict of interest between their investment fund and companies that they cover? I whole-heartedly disagree with that. I think the way this is heading, with tech influencers, journalists and VC's intermingling, is bad. I guess that isn't as easy to agree with when you are a tech influencer, journalist or VC, or rely on one of these people. Luckily, I'm not and don't. As far as MG, information on his talents needs be nothing more than a perusal of his Techcrunch work. Judge for yourself. If this is the baseline for "good" tech writing, then the business is in a world of hurt. Writing over and over about the same few companies with shoddy analysis doesn't cut it for me. And if you read the comments that follow nearly every one of his old Techcrunch articles, you'd see I'm not alone, by any means. I guess not being able to say he sucks goes hand-in-hand with giving everyone a trophy at sporting events. The low of the state of the forums will be when we aren't allowed to speak our minds because we're edited out by the tech powers-that-be-- the Arringtons, the Sarah Lacey's-- and all the sites are not real journalism, but VC mouthpieces. That's where the "echo-chamber" meme comes from. Do you think that's a good end game? That's what we're talking about here.